, 1887-04-23

to repeat what I have said on ell similar
occasions for the last ten y~ears-5that the
suppression of all Press kilograms, even after
the event has already got through by Embas-
sy and banking ciphers in a thousand different
ways, and has been actually telegraphed
back to st. Petersburg only a few hours
afterwards, is the last expression of infantile
stupidity and folly. One loses all patience
IN attempting to convince the censorship au-
thorities that Russia only Injuries herself by
this ndiscriminate and utterly useless pre-
tence of hiding what all the world already
knows. 1t is forgotten that what is known
abroad on such startling events by Govern
ments and private individuals Immediately
becomes known 10 the Press and to the public
at large, and that it is utterly impossible IN
any other European capital for an overt at
tempt TO be made on the head Of the State
and to find the editor of one Of the leading
journals, sitting in his study, with various
members Of his staff, IL hours after the oc-
currence without having the slightest inkling
of what has taken place. This sad picture
of Russian editorial omniscience was indeed
presented to my gaze here late on Sunday
night.
In any case, a Russian editor can afford to
be Indifferent, for if he does know any news
of this kind he dares not to print a word
about it. The common iSUOScbk drivers in
the streets are all talking about Sundays
discovery, but the newspapers up to the
present utter not a word.
l sent you several communications soon
after the arrests, but, as letters as we'll as
kilograms are liable to be confscated on these
occasions, nothing from me may have yet
reached you. In the same way as the En-
peror had to make q wide circuit of she town
on Sunday to avoid the Nihilists, I am obliged
- 1o = 1oAr w. -o,-,1 - a--s1 A.. A.--lI /
censors. 1t appears that of the five persons
arrested on Sunday afternoon three are ex-
PEELED students. The internal machine car
ried by the chief culprit is a most ingenious
representation of an old Russian church
book, and when carried under the arm would
hardly attract any particular attention in this
city of bOokish students if it were not for the
peculiar tape attachment which felldown and
reused the suspicion of the police. 1t is said
that the machine was filed with French NELL
mite, but this may be a grim joke at the ex-
pense of the proposed French alliance.
Th German police, it is now stated, knew
all about the plot beforehand, as usual, and
had long before communicated their discove-
ries to their colleagues in St. Petersburg.
What a wonderful organization is this Ger
%manpolice force! They claim to have foreseen
every Nihilist outbreak in st. Petersburg
since the Turkish campaign, and their warn
ings have not always been properly needed.
Before the explosion at the Winter Palace the
Berlin police sent a plan of the palace which
they had discovered with three crosses marked
where the explosives were to be deposited by
the conspirators: but Count Adlderberg, the
then Minister of the Household, and the
commandants of the palace ridiculed the idea
of the possibility of any such thing until the
explosion actually occurred beneath the I'm
perial ~dining-room. General Gr0sser, the
Project, knew, therefore, ten days or moro
ago that something was contemplated by the
Nihilists. Several suspected students were
already closely watched. The General inform
ed the Gar of the fact, and the consequences
was that the Emperor informed the Empress
that, Notwithstanding her wish to remain ct
st. Petersburg during Lent, they would have
to go back to Gatschina on the 18th.
On Sunday, at l o'clock, a funeral mass
was performed in the fortress cathedra for
the Imperial family and the Court dignitaries
and after the service the Imperial party was
to pass into the Nevsky through the Great
Morskaia and Vosnesensky Prospects to the
Warsaw railway terminus proceeding thence
by special train to Gatschina. A large num-
Der Of the secret police promenaded the streets.
The weather was as bright and clear, with q
sharp frost, as on another fatal Sunday six
years ago. While their Majesties were in
the fortress church, in the midst Of the lee